Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
Public safety may well become the next main constraint on airport capacity. The
UK government is instituting new public safety zone (PSZ) definitions as the result
of studies into risk levels and the tolerability of risk. However, much more work is
required in order to refine appropriate databases on accidents and the distribution of
their location, the implications for casualties and their degree of acceptability before
the public are likely to have confidence in the protection that these measures afford
(Caves, 1996). In any case, the land-use controls that follow from the implementa-
tion of the new PSZs do not apply retrospectively.
Even when the economic growth itself is welcomed, the urbanization that inevi-
tably accompanies major airport expansion (Breheny, 1987) may be less acceptable
than the direct impacts of the airport. An example of concern about the conse-
quences of too much economic activity, in this case tourism, is the Hawaiian island
of Maui. While two other islands decided to extend their runways, Maui rejected
the idea on the grounds of higher property prices, congestion, crime and a reduced
sense of social responsibility (Fujii, Im and Mak, 1992). There may also be concerns
about the potential overheating of local economies.
At the larger scales, both spatially and politically, the costs are seen more in terms
of the global environment and resource depletion, while the benefits are seen more
in terms of the contribution of aviation to regional and national economies and social
welfare.
The main benefits are usually perceived to be job creation and economic growth,
particularly in terms of regeneration and the structure of the economy, together with
positive social consequences in terms of enhanced opportunities and choices. The
benefits are also hard to measure in a way that is useful for policy-makers.
More difficult than the assessment of both the costs and the benefits is how they
are used to make decisions and form policies for planning guidance. One part of the
problem is the appreciation of the imperfections in the metrics and in the interpre-
tation of their consequences. In the UK, both appear to be taken as read by the
Department of Transport, Local Government and the Regions (DTLR - now sim-
ply the Department for Transport) in their ongoing south-east and regional studies
for aviation planning. Another part is the uneven way in which the costs and bene-
fits fall across the population, which could easily be underplayed in those studies.
However, the larger problem is the lack of a rigorous and accepted method for bal-
ancing the unevenly distributed costs and benefits.
Other chapters address the environmental costs of aviation. The rest of this
chapter reviews the benefits and then returns to the question of balancing interests.
B
ENEFITS
In the most advanced economies, society derives its aviation benefits primarily from
the consumer and producer surpluses generated by users who choose aviation in free
competition with other available modes of transport, as described by DETR (1999).
Even in these countries, the case for competitive advantage in job creation and the
stimulation of the economy through access to air transport is often also made.
The user benefits are made self-evident by the revealed demand. They would
normally include savings in cost, time and risk of accident (Brathen et al, 2000).
